Greasy splatter stains are bound to appear on kitchen walls once you use your stove. It’s an inevitable fact of life – like death, taxes and reruns of “It’s a Wonderful Life” at Christmas. The best thing to do is to keep on top of the situation by cleaning the walls around the stove as soon as you see any grease or splatters forming. This will also prevent your kitchen from having that yucky ‘grease trap’ smell found in many restaurant kitchens.
There are times, though, when it’s just not practical to endlessly scrub the walls around your stove, especially if you have young kiddies to keep an eye on or you’re a big fan of deep-fried chicken. So what’s the best way to clean off the grease without taking the paint off, too? The simple answer is to make up some homemade cleaning fluid by filling a bucket with three parts water to one part liquid dishwasher detergent. Then dip a sponge in the mixture and clean the wall, one small patch at a time, while working your way up from the bottom to the top.
Concentrate on each patch until cleaned, allowing the patches to overlap as you move from one to the next. Be sure to change the mixture as soon as it gets very dirty to avoid spreading the grease all over the clean parts of the wall. Once done, go over the wall again using only clear water to rinse off the soap.
For really stubborn stains, fill a spray bottle with a de-greasing agent made from one part white vinegar to one part warm water. Squirt this mixture on the tougher areas then follow the same bottom-to-top cleaning procedure as before with the sponge. Once finished and looking clean again, pat the wall dry with an old towel.
Now let us turn our attention to the potentially soggiest bit of your kitchen – the sink!